Guiding Your Clients to the Right Cash Management Solution

Even with recent speculation about the U.S. becoming a cashless society, cash is still the predominant form of payment, accounting for a third of all transactions. For commercial business clients who accept cash as a form of payment, the need for a more sophisticated approach to handling cash is paramount for maintaining profitability. Familiarizing yourself with what different services cash management providers are offering better positions you to help clients identify their points of need and improve their operations—and their bottom line. This knowledge not only lets you act in an advisory capacity; it allows you to diversify your financial institution’s product offerings.

Knowing the options

When choosing a cash handling provider, business owners have numerous companies to choose from, many offering similar menus of solutions. Some providers offer solutions à la carte, such as smart safes or armored pickup services. Though safes and armored trucks are undoubtedly important features, a complete cash management solution shouldn’t stop there.

Commercial business clients can benefit from a more comprehensive, technology-driven approach that features solutions such as online, real-time access to reporting and account data, top-notch customer and IT support, and remote system monitoring. Some providers even develop this technology in house, which provides their clients with an even more specialized experience.

These capabilities would ideally be integrated into a cohesive ecosystem that also includes smart safe technology and armored transportation services. All these parts working in harmony create a closed-loop cash-handling experience that enables businesses to make faster, more efficient transactions with greater transparency and visibility of their cash and their information.

Maximizing return on investment

An end-to-end approach to cash handling that combines the features and benefits mentioned above offers your clients more for their money. Effective cash handling helps increase operational efficiency by streamlining cash-handling practices. Conventional cash handling, with its touch points and time-consuming processes, comes with no small degree of liability.

Cash-handling solutions are designed to save businesses time and improve efficiency by removing touch points, as well as the need for lengthy employee training. Not only does this help reduce labor costs—and the possibility of human error—it allows business owners the opportunity to reallocate employee time to other more lucrative business activities.

Because smart cash handling automates so many processes, cash flow is expedited, with faster time to deposit. A provider’s relationships with banking partners give business owners faster access to their funds, which are guaranteed and provisionally credited to their account once deposited into the smart safe. Automation, remote monitoring, built-in diagnostic capabilities, and elimination of touch points also reduce the possibility of downtime or the need for in-person servicing.

Smart cash handling also helps mitigate risk. Cash-accepting businesses are natural targets for theft and counterfeiting. In 2016 alone, the U.S. lost $48.9 billion dollars in shrinkage, largely due to internal theft. The right cash management solution can help eliminate these risk factors with features like individual PIN access for every transaction and note validation to protect against counterfeit bills.

Custom configurations

Every business is unique. As such, there’s no one-size-fits-all cash management solution. But a provider with the right mix of products and services can work with your commercial business clients to build an optimal configuration that provides the most benefit and scalability.

Smart safes, for example, can be configured for a single storefront operation or for a large chain. Expansion peripherals, such as coin and note dispensing, tube vend capabilities, or recycling, offer even more flexibility depending on a business’s cash flow needs. Standout providers also work with clients to develop or co-develop in-store operational procedures to integrate new technology into their process flow. This helps ensure that businesses are getting the most out of their investment, and it reduces risk to customers and employees.

If implemented effectively, the cash-handling solutions in place should allow for easy transitioning and scalability as the business grows or changes.